4/7/24 and 4/21/24 GGP

 I missed writing up a game at cop field a few weeks ago, not too much to write home about.  The team I was on got shellacked as usual, something like 13-2 final score.  Lil' Satch came out with me, and was responsible for the first RBI we got, that was nice.

Yesterday's game on the other hand, was a really enjoyable tight well played game.  We had 21 at our zenith and a pretty good crowd of people enjoying the sun in the park, or drinking after their olde tyme baseball game.  The weather was amazing, probably 72 degrees, sunny and bright.

Sonny started for the homers and pitched well, mixing in a devastating curveball with some funky off speed stuff. Nick W was the starter for the visitors and also pitched well.  Shout out to Mike N for catching the whole game.  We had no score through the first 3 frames, a testament to the great pitching.  Aiden finally got us on the board, coming into score on a fielders choice, and with Nick still technically the pitcher of record, I think he gets the win.  We piled on a few more, with the score being 4-0 by the time that I came in.  

We had decided on a 3-3-3 format for pitching, and I was lucky Pierre in the middle.  The first inning I did fine, managing a touch comebacker for the 3rd out.  The 2nd inning, the homers suddenly were seeing everything, and I gave up almost back to back triples, which was a new thing.  They scored 2 and the game was at 5-3 by the time I gave up the pill in the bottom of the 7th.  Aiden came in and shut the door, recording 7Ks in 3 innings, nice work kid!

HR and Mitch pitched for the homers after Sonny, and both did well, but the damage had been done early.

Final 5-3

Highlights

* Greg was back, though not playing, good to see him moving

* The Original Satchel Paige also made a appearance, just moments after Greg and I had talked about him.  Weird.

* Sonny's buddy was a good new addition with the glove and the bat

* Aiden pitched like a beast and played great SS

* Lots of close plays at 1st, kudos to Rick, Nick, Adam for the plays

* HR hit two singles to center that were exactly the same

* I stole home on a passed ball, and even slid into home.  It's been a minute since that happened.

* Adam avoided death at 1st on a really hard hit ball from Aiden

* Father vs. Son: John McG said Not today Death!  hitting a infield single off of Aiden, showing off the speed and beating out the throw, take that youngster!

* My hardest hit ball was caught in center

* Mike Lattig and Elon back after a long spell

See you soon!

S. Paige

3/31/24 GGP

Happy Zombie Jesus Day everyone!  I sent out an email querying if there was enough interest in a game, since I don't know how many people would be stuck at Easter egg hunts, or ham luncheons.  Turns out, enough sinners out there to mostly fill a baseball field.  In hindsight, maybe I should have stayed home.

I started for the homers, and from the jump I remarked that the opposite team did not have any holes in their lineup.  I was poo pooed once again, but this time, I think I was on pretty solid ground:

Mitch, Adam, Mike N, Tony, HR, Sean, Arson, and Dave.  Not much in the way of weakness there, in fact, this is the kind of lineup that would give the SQ guys a run for their money.  But I digress, I don't mean to disparage my own team, but it was a little lopsided.  The best out of nowhere player of the game was Rick Kvoriak, who appeared as though it hadn't been 9 years, and was right back into it.

We struck first in the first with a sac fly for the first run, and that was about all we did for the day.  The visitors came back and added a run to go ahead, and they never looked back.  I felt like I was throwing alright, and I had a few low pitch innings in the beginning of the game.  Then came the 4th, and I think it might have taken 40 minutes to get 3 outs.  I don't know how many times the lineup batted, but it was a lot.  Our defense crumbled, the visitors had about 7 dinks just beyond the grasp of the players, and then someone would hammer the fuck out of the ball and we would start over.  We did not have an out the first time through the lineup that inning. Ouch.

A cap tip to Arson, who after 2 at bats hitting the ball higher than anyone ever has, he leveled it a little and took me to deep deep center.  The bases were loaded at the time, so a grand salami for the kid.  The distance combined with his young legs, he could have cartwheeled into home and still made it easily.  By my reckoning, this is about accurate.

So that happened, and then a few innings later he did it again, with the bases loaded again.  He was stopped from having another grand slam by the pace of the runners in front of him, who were going station to station by that point.  

We had the bases loaded at one point, and we hit into a 5-2-3 double play.  So that was our strategy.

We only played 7 innings, I stayed in to eat the whole thing, which seemed like the right thing to do.  Sean left early, HR and Mike came in to get their innings, we fared no better, and the game was mercifully over at a soft 10-1.

Highlights:

* Arson was deadly with the bat, but also behind the dish, catching a great game.

* Thank you to everyone that made it out to make it a game

* Thanks to HR and his mob of fans, for extolling his game record, and highlights throughout.  Always great when I can hear of my failings in real time.  Oh, and the baby is cute too.

* We did manage a force out at home to save a run.

* The visitors were so fat in talent they had Mitch playing right field, and he managed to catch one of the few hits I got, which was a dying quail to right that no one else would have been able to get....

* While on the topic, we had several players on our team that refused to play right because... it wasn't exciting enough, I guess...which when we are trading defenses makes it a lot harder to do.  Remember, sometimes we all have to give a little, for the good of the game.

* Rick shook off the rust to play first base, and stopped several balls with every part of his body except his glove hand.

* Chris Powell rage hit a ball deep, trying to hit a 9 run homer

* The field was in really good shape, so that is something

* I hit Dave twice, nothing personal

* Gaspar and Bob did great behind the dish for us.

* Mitch had an amazing bunt that started the never ending 4th inning

* I had to warn Tony that he was getting one in the back if the runner tried to steal with the score as lopsided as it was.  He said he had already warned his team about that, but they were not having it.  Luckily I didn't have to do it.

3/17/24 GGP

What a day for a ballgame, the weather was amazing, sunny, not too much wind, and we had 17 players showed up.  The tones of a rock and roll show were present through the game, not sure what it was, but it was there.

The teams were askew from the beginning, but everyone sticks to the story of all the times that the teams are uneven and then the game goes the other way.  Well, this wasn't the case in this game.  Our team never scored a run, and we got to 3rd base twice, I think.  

Nick W was pitching a gem to start and Mitch came in and dominated us a little more.  Sonny was starting for us and he pitched well, but the home team had so many singles they could not be stopped.  Our defense was not helping us much either, we clanged and frisbeed our share as well.

I will focus on the positives, we had some great catches in the outfield when we needed them.  Nick caught several very high pop flies in left field, and the same with Bob in center.  Nick Smith, Bob and JT in the outfield in the 7th inning sets the MBC record for the oldest outfield staffed. So that is something.

I came in after Sonny, and felt good, the fastball was cooking at times.  The curveball finally went where I wanted it to go, which hasn't happened in months.  We slowed the scoring a bit, but the homers still eked out a few more from us.

Final Score- 8-0, home team.

Highlights

* Thanks for making it out everyone

* Ana had one our few hits, and was the one of the two players that made it to 3rd.

* Don played SS and made it look easy

* Greg did a great job blocking the ball

* Powell and Mitch together again, much to our destruction.

* Mental note to Alejandro, don't be stealing bases with a 6 run lead

* I had 3 hits, 2 singles and a double, did not score.

* Gaspar with the clean hit to the gap

* Nick W had an epic at bat, likely 12 foul balls, maybe 15-16 total pitches.

* I made the plays at 3rd, had trouble with the throws

2/11/24 GGP

Why do we deal with the high taxes, the sometimes confusing and overburdensome laws, the overpopulation? Because on February 11th, a month and a 1/2 before the beginning of Spring we can play a baseball game in Golden Gate Park where not only was the sun shining, it was actually warm.

We had 22 players come out for the game before the game and ours proved to be very much like the Super Bowl®. Sean started for the homers and Satch started for the visitors. I had made the request of my teammates beforehand that I not be allowed to pitch more than 4 innings and I mostly held to that, though I did request a fifth inning because I had not planned on the sun being so warm that I actually felt good pitching. 

Sean looked good as well, the sweat started early on him and looking like the Batman logo across his back. Sean lasted a few innings more than I and then Mitch came in after him.  I bowed out after 5 innings and gave the ball over to Dave, And then Chris Powell and then John McGrath for the close. 

We had a couple of new players some from the Mayan organization, Ethan who came with Connor, and one a recruit from Sonny, Javier, who quickly showed us that he knows how to play The Game.  Sure was nice to have an abundance of players, let's hope that continues.

The game was a real back-and-forth battle, we were tied at 2 then we went up to 4, then we went up to 6, then my last inning I gave up a run and some hits/errors and then the homers scored 2 on an unfortunate 2-out clank in right field. We were tied at 6 for a while, and coming down the home stretch bottom of the ninth, 7-7 ball game the homers were able to pull out a victory, thanks to 2 wild pitches and a ground ball from Sean to me at 2nd.  I heaved it to home with all that I had, but not enough, and the homers won, 8-7.

Highlights

* Full ranks, great playing

* Marcie came out with her little gum drop, then left him in the stands, and came in to knock a hard single up the middle, notching the MBC's first post-natal hit statistic (PNH).  I am sure Bill James will include that in the next SABR update.

* Carlos and Reumaldo both had a couple of amazing plays in left field

* John McGrath did a great job with the bat and behind the dish

* The grass makes the hardest ground ball a slow roller

* Some bang-bang plays at 1st!

* At one point, the average height of our outfielders was 5'3

* Don, Javier, Sean, Dave, Alejandro, Powell, McG, all put the muscle on the ball

* Mitch hit a ball one-handed for a single that he had no business even touching

* My last at-bat I finally got into one, loud grunt and all, and I think this is about where it landed.  The shameful part is that I only got a single.  The really shameful part is that I probably have had longer singles....